


L'amour des deux lapins: A première vue

by Polly_Lynn



Series: The Bunny Verse [2]
Category: Castle
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-17
Updated: 2014-06-17
Packaged: 2018-02-05 00:36:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,896
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1799017
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Polly_Lynn/pseuds/Polly_Lynn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"He's not . . . He wants to explain that he's <em>not</em>. That he didn't even know what he was walking into. He didn't even realize this place was here. Even though he must have walked past it a hundred times, he had no idea."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: A prequel to "L'amour de deux lapins." Yes, I know the French is wrong.

Castle loves rain. Really.

He's into the symbolism. The gritty summer skies washed clean. The baking hot, filthy streets and sidewalks lit up with borrowed glitter for an hour or two.

New York is never the same city after a rainstorm. It's all dressed up. Deception or possibility or both. Either way, rain makes for a hundred new ways to describe the same old setting.

And the Piña Colada Song notwithstanding, no one is more convinced than he of the romantic potential of a downpour. It stirs banked memories and sharpens constant desire into something immediate and pressing. It makes him want her. It makes him want to lock the doors and have her, wordless and tangled up and taking the heat from his skin. From his body into hers.

His pro-rain position is firmly established, but he is _done_ with this particular rain. He's done with this entire day, but the rain really puts the punctuation on the whole sorry mess.

There's a hole in the bottom of his criminally expensive shoe, and his hair is long enough to be some kind of perfect gutter system. Every drop of rain carefully bypasses his jacket and makes its way down his collar and directly on to his skin.

That particular detail is insult to injury. He'd skipped out of the precinct early, to the tune of merciless teasing from Ryan and Esposito—teasing from which Beckett felt _no_ obligation to defend him—and hauled all the way across town for the barber's appointment he'd been sure he'd made.

He must have gotten the date wrong, though, because Ilya is out of the country, and the last time he'd let anyone else near his head, he'd had to go into seclusion until time, length, and product could beat the cowlicks back.

He's been splashed and dripped on. He's been packed into the subway with wet, ornery commuters and their poky umbrellas. He's drenched and steaming—because the determined, endless downpour has done nothing to put a dent in the outrageous heat— and now the streets are packed with slow-moving, disgruntled rush-hour New Yorkers.

He's just about done.

He's _so_ close to home. Barely two blocks from a shower and dry clothes, but that somehow makes it worse. As the foot traffic gets denser and the rain comes down harder and harder, it all takes on the throat-closing quality of an anxiety dream.

The spoke of a particularly vicious umbrella catches him in the temple. The severe woman wielding it interrupts her clipped cell phone conversation long enough to profanely advise him to watch out.

The force and placement of the blow are enough to stagger him briefly. It sends him into the path of another umbrella. He leans sharply out of the way, and his skull makes contact with plate glass on the other side.

He sees stars and decides that however close to home he is, it's time to wait things out. The storm, the stupidity, or his impatience with it. He's not quite sure.

He tugs open the first available door to his left. It's such a shift in atmosphere that he mistakes it for calm at first. The light is dimmer. It's a more constant hum than the blinding stops and starts of headlights in rush-hour traffic on a sullen, gray day.

The steady stream of a dozen conversations fills the cramped space, but each one is low, and the urgency occupies a different frequency. Each one lists toward privacy. There's a static, interior hush that dampens and flattens the noise, despite a confusion of something underneath. A variety of insistent sounds that compete with the words, making a different kind of sense.

He registers the smells next. Sharp and warm, with strong notes beneath. Antiseptic and bodies and sawdust. It's neither wholly pleasant or unpleasant.

He steps clear of the doorway. It's an instinctive, lateral move born of a lifetime in the city, and he finds himself in a corner, back against the plate-glass windows that look out on to the street and across a narrow aisle from a large, busy reception desk of some kind.

He tries to get his bearings. There's a humming energy to the place, but the shift is restful after the frustrations of the street. Knots of people bend their heads together at the desk. Two rows of back-to-back folding chairs stretch across the width of the space, occupied by strangers who sit thigh to thigh and give each other tight, sympathetic smiles.

It's some kind of lobby, he realizes. A doctor's office, he thinks at first. Something about the smell and clipboards and the not-so-steady tick of names being called.

A harried-looking young woman in a red t-shirt greets Castle with a sincere, but short-lived smile. She tells him to feel free to browse.

"And if there's anyone you want to snuggle, just grab a volunteer!" She tugs at an emblem on her shirt for emphasis and spins away.

Castle nods. His head is still buzzing and he hasn't quite adjusted yet. His mind catches up with her verb choice: _Snuggle_.

He looks around. Details snap into place. Stacks of wire crates stretch from floor to ceiling at intervals along the walls and in columns, two by two, at the corners of the large room. The floor is broken up by a handful of mesh-topped tables and the reception desk is flanked by bird cages. Every enclosure is alive with movement and sound.

Small animal carriers litter the floor in front of the folding chairs. Castle sees everything from chic fabric shoulder bags to cheap plastic and the occasional sturdy cardboard housing that bears the the shelter's logo.

_Shelter._

He feels an insistent nudge at his shin. He looks down to find a broad, brindled head dipping for his knee again. Castle holds out a tentative hand. The dog raises its nose for one suspicious second then happily bumps an ear against the proffered fingers.

"I'm sorry! No . . . doggie, no!" A young woman blushes pink as she tugs on the leash. It's bright red leather stamped with a cute design of cartoon bones, but it's clipped to a dirty, sawed off thing wound around the dog's neck in a makeshift collar. "I'm sorry! He's . . . I think he's friendly."

"He's fine," Castle smiles down at her as the dog presses a humid nose into his palm. "Not yours?"

She shakes her head. "Found him wandering in the neighborhood. I brought him here. He's not chipped, though. They'll take him . . ." She swallows hard and swipes at her eyes. "God, they're gonna think I'm the one dumping him!"

"You already have one of your own, don't you?" The woman looks startled. Castle gestures by way of explanation. "The leash."

"Yeah." The woman's face softens in pleasant memory. "Got her here. She's already too big for our place." She curls her nails along the dog's jaw. He sits at her feet, pressing close against her calves. "They're really good here. He'll be fine. And . . . my boyfriend would _kill_ me," she says more to the dog than Castle.

"Hard not to get attached, though." Castle gives her a sympathetic smile.

"Yeah." She pats the dog's flank and his tongue lolls out in doggie ecstasy.

The door opens to admit a new flood of people. The brindle dog dances with a small terrier. A tired-looking man tries to manage an impatient child of about six with one hand and a carrier that's full of very angry cat with the other.

Castle looks around, trying to find some place out of the way to remove himself to.

"Good luck," he calls over his shoulder to the woman.

She waves a thank you. "Careful who you get attached to."

"Oh, I'm not . . ." Castle trails off.

He's not . . . He wants to explain that he's _not_. That he didn't even know what he was walking into. He didn't even realize this place was here. Even though he must have walked past it a hundred times, he had no idea.

He wants to tell someone that he's _not._ It feels important. Critical to say it out loud. To have witnesses. But the woman isn't listening.

Nobody's listening, and it suddenly strikes Castle that being here is a spectacularly bad idea. A dangerous idea.

He's _not,_ but he'd love to.

It rushes in at him. Images. Sensations. Fantasies.

Something running around the loft. Curling up when they leave and padding to the door when they come home. Eager demands and imperious ones. To be fed, walked, played with. Loved.

A cat, he thinks immediately. A kitten. A fluffy, mischievous little thing with deep green eyes winding around Kate's ankles. Scaling the office bookshelves and tangling herself up in sailboat rigging. Or maybe an older one. Sleek and elegant. Draped carelessly along the back of the couch while Kate stretches out to read.

His heart thumps hard against his ribs. Dangerous. All of it dangerous, but he sees it so clearly. He can feel the rumbling purr under his fingertips. He can taste Kate's smile as she complains about snags in her work pants and hair everywhere. But he can taste her smile and hear her murmuring, frustrated and fond as her long, elegant fingers smooth along dark fur.

It's a bad idea. Letting his mind run with this is a bad idea, but he can't stop.

It's a dog now. A solid, warm weight bumping against their legs while they cook together in the kitchen. Kate squealing at an unexpected cold nose pressed in to her thigh. Scolding and insisting that he's not allowed on the furniture. In the bed. Scolding and laughing as he worms his way in between them.

Then he sees the two of them walking him in the park. She doesn't scold then. She runs, open and easy and laughing, and the dog chases. She snags his hand and the two of them linger in the sun together, on a bench or a blanket with a picnic, while the dog chases a ball in the distance. Away and back again, over and over.

He'd love to have that. Dog or cat or ground sloth or whatever. He'd love to share that with Kate, and the want—the longing for it—is a sudden ache that he's wary of.

This is _such_ a bad idea.

He's suddenly aware of the table-top kennel at his hip. That it's filled with a litter of kittens. Two or three sleeping together in heaps. Another pair of them tearing around the perimeter, feinting and leaping on each other. Making tremendous pounces that have their spines ringing out along the mesh top. They play at fierceness and collapse together, exhausted, only to spring up again the next second.

His mind starts to make sense of all the sounds. A story starts to spool around him. His head swings toward the door to his left. A clash of sound swells and recedes as it creaks open and closed, admitting and expelling volunteers. A lonely whimpering chorus and the eager staccato of barks. That must be where they keep most of the dogs. A swinging door and dozens of sad stories.

And there are more out here. Right in front of him. All around him. So much sadness, but love waiting to happen, too.

His ear picks out a low conversation. A volunteer explaining to a heart-broken woman and two small children that the shelter can't just hold on to Dora and Diego for them. That they'll have to make them available for adoption, but it's the right thing to do. That the shelter will do everything they can to keep them together—they'll find them a good home—but it's the right thing to do.

The glass-fronted section to Castle's right resolves into sense. He's hardly noticed it before, but it's a clinic. Staff in medical scrubs lean toward people in street clothes looking hopeful. Looking desperate and sorrowful.

Castle swallows and looks away, but there's nowhere safe for his gaze to fall. This is _such_ a bad idea.

He's transfixed again by the woman and the stray brindle. The recently arrived terrier has run right between his legs, entirely underneath his big body. The dog peers down and back up at the woman in amicable confusion. She bends toward him and laughs fondly.

Just then, a name sounds out from the reception desk. The woman stands with an awkward, guilty jerk. She stoops to run her fingers over the dog's head. She tips her face toward his ear and says a few words. The dog grins up at her, his stumpy, tailless butt wriggling. The woman sucks in a breath as she leads him away from his new friend.

Castle sees the tears in her eyes and drops his own gaze, uneasy for any number of reasons. The rain pounds against the shelter's glass front, more determined than ever as the wind kicks up and turns the storm sideways. He really needs to get out of here, rain or no rain.

He tries to step toward the door, but the man with the cat carrier wants to make his way to the folding chair recently vacated by the woman. His six-year-old is howling now to keep the cat company. The carrier swings wildly in his hand as the cat hurls himself against its sides.

Castle ends up backing further from the door to give him space and bumps into something. It's one of the converted tables. It's smaller and more makeshift than some of the others, and it sways on unsteady legs. He stretches out his hands at right angles to steady what seems to be an inverted mesh box on top.

He peers through the dense maze of wire trying to make sense of what's inside. The sharp smell of cedar wafts up. The enclosure is dotted with irregular expanses of fur. Dark and light and half concealed by piled up bedding and a variety of overturned things. Heavy plastic planters, maybe, with tiny doors cut out. Improvised housing for whatever's inside.

He's still working it out when the whole place erupts into chaos.

* * *

  



	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: So, you've all read the "Shameless" disclaimer, right? Yeah. This is SUPER without shame. This has not heard of shame.

* * *

Castle catches so little of it at first. Too many things happen at once to really take anything in. A tremendous bang draws his attention to the street entrance. The shelter door stands open, apparently caught in the wind. A sudden gust drives in a determined patter of rain that hits the floor, the aluminum folding chairs, and a handful of plastic carriers like small-caliber gunfire.

A dismayed chorus goes up from the people nearest the door. Chairs clang together and screech over tile as people crowd back away from the sudden spray.

The howling cat loses it completely then. The noise scrapes over Castle's eardrums and the carrier jerks mightily. The man loses his grip. The carrier falls, tips, and just manages to right itself before it skids across the wet lobby floor. The little boy is beside himself. He shrieks something ridiculous—something only a small child with naming rights to a pet would think of—as he stumbles after the carrier.

Castle turns and wonders briefly why the damned door is still standing open. He starts toward it, but there's yet another incredible noise. It stops him in his tracks. It starts low. At first it's hardly there. Barely audible underneath everything else, but it builds.

Castle feels the sound pulling him back around and he sees the brindle dog. His head is low, and the fur across his shoulders stands at full attention. It's a snarl. Deadly serious, even though it seems impossible that it's coming from the happy, affectionate creature of two minutes ago.

The dog's hindquarters bunch and he lunges. The makeshift collar is no match for his sudden fury. It jerks open, and the woman is left, open mouthed and aghast, holding the dangling leash.

The cat carrier skids into the dog's path, followed by the little boy. Everything on two legs sucks in a breath at the same time, waiting for the worst to happen, but the dog breaks hard to his left at the last second. He somehow veers around them.

Castle is just trying to figure out how to wedge himself into the dog's path—how to do anything useful—when something hits him in the shins. An incredibly _solid_ something.

He can't make any sense of it. He lurches back and registers the pain of a blossoming bone bruise. He bends at the waist and tries to find his feet again. It's tan, whatever it is, and enormous. It's broad and front loaded with a positively huge head and shoulders, and the brindle dog _hates_ it.

He skitters into a cluster of suddenly empty folding chairs and digs in again. He's headed directly for Castle and the other dog. _Dog._ That's what it is—an absolutely massive bulldog cutting Castle off at the knees.

Castle grabs for the bulldog's collar. That's his entire plan. There's no phase two, but no one else seems to be doing anything. And anyway, it doesn't matter. The bulldog has momentum and determination on its side. Castle misses the collar by a millimeter. The bulldog broadsides him and sends him crashing backwards into the mid-sized enclosure. It topples, table and all.

Suddenly it's raining rabbits.

Castle doesn't know that immediately. That it's rabbits that the bulldog has lost its mind for. He doesn't know much in all the confusion, just two things: The bulldog is charging toward the small furry things tipping out of the cage in a frantic stream, and the brindle wants nothing more than to _end_ the bulldog.

Castle's back hits the reception desk and finally— _finally_ —someone else is moving. A squat man in bermuda shorts waddles after the bulldog all too slowly. His voice gets the dog's attention for a brief moment, though.

The brindle dog gets his body between the bulldog and Castle and the rabbits. His head and shoulders are low to the ground. He's barking furiously and snapping. He's deadly serious, even though the bulldog must have thirty pounds on him.

The bulldog hauls his bulk around to face the brindle, thankfully distracted from his would-be prey for just long enough. A couple of red-shirted volunteers approach from around the sides of the scene, calling out information to one another in low, surprisingly calm voices.

There are rabbits everywhere. They dive under Castle's bent knees and clamber over his shins. His lap fills and empties again and again. He feels a squirming rush at his lower back where it doesn't quite meet the wood of the reception desk. A fawn-colored streak races up his arm and across his chest, pausing briefly to twitch its nose at him curiously.

They all seem to be headed in the same direction. They hop and scrabble and make for a dark corner off the reception desk that leads into a short hallway. Off to that side, Castle sees another volunteer snatching up the tiny bodies and depositing them behind the safety of the waist-high door that allows entry behind the desk.

The man in bermuda shorts has the bulldog by the collar now, a snapped leash in his other hand. He's sputtering mad, though it's not entirely clear at whom. Two of the volunteers stand between him and the brindle dog. The woman who brought the stray in is crouched beside the dog, trying to calm him down.

Castle hears his name. He lets out a breath and his head sinks against the reception desk before that strikes him as strange. Several things strike him as strange all at once, but it's hard to sort them out.

"Yeah?" He looks up to his right to find a woman about his age looking down at him. She's . . . excited? "Sorry, yes?"

"I thought it was you!"

She crouches next to him. She's definitely excited, and that's not getting any less strange. She's chattering all of a sudden. About books. But she's thanking him, too. And saying she loves him. And asking him for something.

"What?" Castle's heart is pounding harder than ever. He has no idea who this woman is or what she wants. All he knows is she's doing nothing for the panic hangover he's nursing after the adrenaline.

"I just . . . I can take them. The little one first," she says. And then, as though it explains everything, she adds, "otherwise, she'll run right at them and he'll follow."

"Little one?"

He follows her gaze down to his own lap, more than a little startled by that particular turn of events at first.

"Oh. Little one," he breathes.

His lap—all of him from the waist down, really—is kind of a confusion of fur. Pure white and charcoal grey and every imaginable shade of brown. And . . . _oh_. . . it's not really any better from the waist up. He's covered in fur. A lot of it seems to be remnants of the stampede, but not all.

Some of the fur is on the move.

One of his legs is still half drawn up and there's a tiny, _tiny,_ black tuft of determination scaling it. Getting as high as she possibly can to face down the bulldog. She's making a fortress of Castle's body. The angle of his hip and the crook of his 's pacing the perimeter like she's biding her time, stealing peeks over the top of his wrist and using the folds of his jacket sleeve as a blind.

And she's not alone. There's something else going on down between his ankles. Something circling on the floor, knocking at the insides of Castle's legs and thumping the tile, but Castle only has eyes for the little one at first.

She's a little more than half the size of his fist. She's beautiful. He sees that, but it's not what captivates him. It's the fact that she's absolutely without fear. At least a dozen of her kind streamed over and past and around her, every one of them wild-eyed and panicked. And here she is, this little thing, calm and absolutely focused.

Castle touches her head tentatively. She twitches but her attention never wavers. She doesn't spare him a look. The brindle dog is still dancing and whimpering, though the woman's presence is clearly settling him down. The little rabbit has zero interest in the brindle dog, Castle, or anyone else right now. Zero interest. She wants the bulldog.

Black ears twitch up, just clearing the wall of his forearm. The big rabbit thumps the tile loudly. The bulldog whips around again. He snaps his jaws, whipping a string of drool against the bare legs of what must be his owner.

Castle feels muscle bunch against his thigh. The rabbit is airborne, headed straight for the dog. Given everything still ringing around in his head—the confusion of it all and the reality that she's just so _tiny_ —Castle has no idea how he manages to catch her.

But his hand comes up. He intercepts, and his fingers close around her. She twitches madly in the confines of his palm. He cups his other hand around her, giving her more room, but not enough to get loose. She's chattering and so _furious_ that Castle jerks back from the force of it.

There's another sudden flurry down between his knees. He almost loses the little one at the alarming sensation of something heavy scrabbling up and landing solidly in the middle of his thigh.

Castle looks down at the big rabbit. _Immense_ rabbit.

He's easily four times the size of the dark, angry force of nature currently pummeling Castle's palms. His fur is all dappled shades of brown where she is uninterrupted dark. The freckled expanse of the rabbit's head swings left to right. Stubborn determination when he looks at Castle, and something helpless and urgent—something familiar—when he looks at the little rabbit.

Castle lowers his hands, carefully bringing the little rabbit down to him. The big rabbit raises up, wobbling a little on the shifting plane of his thigh. He lands his paws on Castle's thumbs. He touches his nose to the little rabbit's and smiles. There's no other word for it. He _smiles._

The little rabbit startles back. She chatters her teeth a few times and bumps the big rabbit grumpily with her nose. She settles then, calm all of a sudden, and she rests her nose against his.

"Mr. Castle . . . Mr. Castle, I should probably . . ."

The volunteer shifts nervously on her heels. She's still crouching next to him. Castle had forgotten about her. About the dogs and the near-death experience. He'd forgotten about the rain and the day's frustrations. About the sadness and hope and worry winding all around him.

He'd forgotten about everything except the love story unfolding in the palm of his hand.

"I should probably take them, Mr. Castle." The volunteer finally finishes. She looks apologetic and starstruck and a little wary of him.

"No," he says quickly. He pulls his elbows into his sides. His shoulders curve protectively around the little rabbit. The big rabbit climbs fearlessly upward, taking shelter, too. As near to her as he can get. "No. I've got them. I've got both of them."

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Oh, hi! Me again. So, yeah. While I was sitting with my brindle friend, he was SUPER-sweet with every other animal in the place. Curious, but totally cool to cats, other dogs, the squawking parrot etc. UNTIL this guy came in with this massive, unfixed American bulldog. Brindle dog HATED that bulldog from instant one. His ratty not!collar thing did come apart, but I managed to bear hug him before he got away from me and he then was totally ashamed of himself for losing his cool. Guy with the bulldog was a total wang, too.
> 
> Sadly, no ruggedly handsome writers covered in bunnehs. But happily also no bunnehs in peril. I do not do well with animals in peril.


	3. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: This epilogue is a bit of a chronological cheat. It's technically chapter 1.5 of the original "L'amour" story.
> 
> It continues in the vein of utter shamelessness

* * *

"It could have been worse."

He's pushing it. It's stupid, but he can't help it. She's not saying _No_ anymore. She's not saying much at all, but in a good way. In a _great_ way.

She's kneeling up over the back of the armchair. Her arms are loose, resting on either side of her chin, and her face is soft and full of absolute delight.

She rolls her cheek to rest against the leather chair back and shoots him a look. It's definitely A Look, but he's fearless tonight.

Now he is, anyway. He's pushing it. Because she's not saying _No_ any more.

"Worse. _Really_. . ." It's A Look for sure, but there's this tiny little smile that goes with it, too. Something entirely new and he thinks his heart might burst.

"Totally." He skims the back of his fingers along her arm. "I was covered in them at one point. It was like the snuggliest retreat _ever._ "

She snorts and turns her attention back to the floor.

They've pushed the armchairs at right angles to each other and blocked the exits underneath with couch cushions and throw pillows.

The rabbits are scouting their limited territory below.

The dark one leads. She takes tiny hops around the perimeter of the space, wedging her nose under the baseboard at the wall and prodding at the the cushions as the most obvious points of weakness. Occasionally she scoots backward. She gives the big one A Look and he moves in, shoving with his head or turning around to kick out with his enormous back feet.

Kate holds her breath. She tenses whenever they get any movement in the cushions at all. They spent an anxious half hour earlier coaxing the little one out from under the wine refrigerator. Kate did, really.

They'd been sitting on the floor behind the kitchen island with their legs outstretched, the soles of her feet pressed to his, while the rabbits scrabbled between them in seeming contentment. There'd been a noise. A car backfiring out on the street or something, and the little one had just taken off in an absolute streak.

Castle had hardly even seen where she'd gone, but Kate was after her in a heartbeat. Face down on the floor, talking softly to her. He'd just hung back. Tried his best to soothe the big rabbit who was doing his damnedest to go after her. Hell bent on the impossible task of wedging himself into the narrow space.

Kate had been absolutely calm through the whole thing. She'd just lay there patiently, offering her fingers and talking until the little rabbit edged out all on her own.

But her hands haven't really steadied since. Not quite.

She's worried now they'll get out again. That the little one will disappear somewhere. That she might hurt herself.

She's worried and he knows she's not quite half convinced that he really does know a guy who will come through and deliver a rabbit containment system before midnight. She's worried he hasn't though this through.

"Have you ever even _had_ a pet, Castle?"

"I suppose you won't let me count imaginary ones," he says. That gets him another Look. He shakes his head. "Then no. Always wanted a dog, but mother would always look horrified and declare that it just wasn't practical."

"And you just kept asking, didn't you?"

"Over and over and over," he admits. "But as much as I'd love to cast my mother as the villain, she was probably right."

Kate tips her head toward him again, surprised. "Castle, did you just admit that some things are _impractical?"_

" _Were,_ " he corrects. "Were impractical. We are living in the future, Beckett, and all things are possible."

He reaches his hand down between the chairs. The big bunny rolls back on to his haunches. He sits up and flails his front paws playfully at Castle's fingers.

Kate laughs and roughs a hand over the rabbit's head. She wiggles her fingers to join in the game, but the little one thumps testily. The big rabbit's attention shifts back to his duties.

"So it's not impractical now. But back then?" She pulls her arm back up. She folds it along the back of the chair and rests her cheek on her forearm like she's settling in for the story.

It's . . . unusual. They talk. Of course they talk. They do the life story thing in bits and pieces. But it's unusual for her to ask like this. Head on and for no other reason he can see than she's curious.

It's unusual, but not unwelcome. Not unwelcome at all.

"Well, we moved a lot. And a lot of time there wasn't money for that kind of thing. Some places weren't really keen on children, let alone pets." He keeps his eyes on the rabbits. It's easier, though he's not sure why he needs it to be easier. It was a long time ago. "And sometimes the apartment math just didn't work out."

"Apartment math?" She smiles down at the rabbits like she's telling them this is going to be good.

He smiles, too, thankful for whatever magic this is that has her like and open and asking for stories even though he knows she's still worried. That he blindsided her with this and she has every right to freak out a little.

"Apartment math," he repeats. "Small place, so small dog. And we mostly lived in some not great neighborhoods . . ."

". . . so not safe for a woman or a kid to be out walking something small," she finishes.

He nods in confirmation, and she's quiet, then. He's about to ask. He wants her story, too. He doesn't think she ever had pets, but he's not sure. He wants to know, but something tells him to wait.

He glances up and catches her staring. She's watching him watch the rabbits and she looks . . . smitten. With him. With the rabbits.

He goes warm inside—bright and full and over the moon with it all—and he thinks his question can wait. Because he caught her staring and she looks fond and happy. She looks smitten, but curious, too. Like she's not done asking yet, so he waits.

She nods. Like she gets it. Like she's grateful he's giving her the chance to ask. "What about Alexis? Did she ask over and over and over?"

"She did," he sighs. "And I was the villain of the piece."

"You grew out of it?" she sneaks a quick look down at the rabbits like she's worried again. Like she might start up with _No_ again any second. "Wanting one?"

"No," he says quickly. "Never. I just . . . I wanted her to have something. I wanted her to have everything I missed out on."

"But?" she prompts softly when he doesn't go on.

"When she was about four, she was having a hard time. I thought about it then. Meredith was gone a lot, and she had to come with me when I was traveling. She was good. She was always good, but it was hard on her. I thought a pet might be something . . . stable." He rests his cheek against the back of his own chair and reaches out to trace the path of a long curl sweeping over her shoulder.

She watches. She listens.

"I was writing one night and it was way past her bedtime. I heard her crying. I thought she must be having a nightmare, but she was sitting there in the corner of her room with this mostly dead mylar balloon in her lap. Some bribe or consolation prize from Meredith." He breaks off and she waits for him now. She catches his fingers as they trail off her shoulder and tucks them with her own underneath her cheek. He turns toward her in the chair, leaning closer.

"She was sobbing so hard she couldn't talk," he says finally, surprised at how helpless he still sounds—how helpless he still feels after all this time. "And when she finally could, she said she missed the balloon. That hurt to have it and then be without it."

They're quiet, then. She presses her lips to his fingers and doesn't say anything and he's grateful. He still worries that he was wrong.

He's more than grateful when she tells him her own story. When he doesn't even have to ask. When she just turns her face toward him and starts.

"I had goldfish." She thinks a minute. "Three, I think. Or four."

"Three _or_ four." He smiles and cranes his head back toward the rabbits. "Don't worry, guys. _I'll_ remember there's two of you."

"Jerk." She laughs and nips at the hand still trapped under her cheek. "They were school bazaar goldfish. Won them a few years running throwing ping pong balls into their bowls. Not exactly hearty."

"Nothing fluffy, though?"

She shakes her head.

He frees his hand and traces his fingers over her cheek. He pictures it. Little Katie Beckett wrapping her arms around some happy, slobbery creature. Holding her arms out and letting something tiny hook its claws into her and climb her from ankle to shoulder.

The picture dissolves abruptly. It suddenly occurs to him that maybe she didn't. Maybe this is something she's never once wanted.

"Did you want one? Something to snuggle?" He sounds anxious. He _is_ anxious.

She laughs though. She sees the panic. Hears it and she laughs. She turns her lips to his palm.

"I did." She smiles wide at him and then bounces up higher on her knees. She dangles her arms and hooks her chin over the chair back. "I always did, but my dad's allergic to pretty much everything."

The little rabbit is standing at the exact center of the small space. She's peering at the chair bottoms. Intent.

Kate laughs down at the two of them. Her nose wrinkles as the big rabbit suddenly starts turning himself in circles as fast as his big body will allow.

"What's he . . . . ?"

The words break off as the big rabbit lets his momentum carry his broad flank into the cushion. He jolts it a few inches under the chair, but it stalls.

Kate's on the floor in a second, though, popping it back in place. She dives back up into the chair and leans way over the back, staring down as if she can't quite believe they're still there.

"Kate." Castle smooths a hand over her back. He leans over to rest his chin on her shoulder. "It's ok. They're ok. They're not getting out."

"I know," she says and her voice is strange. It's worried, but her breath catches and her fists clench. She's rooting for them too. She looks up at him, her face half hidden by the sweep of her hair. "Did you _see_ that?"

He nods against her. He saw it. He sees it. He sees the rabbits nosing at each other playfully. He peers over her shoulder and sees the look on her face. It's amazing.

Something bold and stubborn in the little rabbit draws her. She's completely caught up in their adventure. She's as crazy in love with them as he is.

He sees the look on her face and he just doesn't know what to do with it other than lean down and kiss her hair, her jaw, her neck. Wherever his lips land.

It's better than anything he imagined. She turns back and laughs against him and it's a thousand times better.

He's kissing her and she's kissing him and the rabbits are on to their next scheme.

His phone buzzes in his pocket. He keeps kissing her as he moves to silence it. He doesn't want to miss a minute of this, but then he worries that it's Art touching base about the pen. He knows it'll be here. That Art will come through, but he'll take away as much of the worry as he can. He'll take it away and leave her nothing but smitten.

"One sec," he whispers and kisses her one more time. "One sec."

He digs out the phone and snaps two pictures, one of the rabbits and one of Kate sticking her tongue out him.

He turns himself to lean back in his own chair. He glances down at the screen and sees it's a series of alerts from one of the fan sites. A sudden influx, all in a row. It's a surprise and not necessarily a good one. It's kind of the downtime between book and the sites have been slow.

He has a long, sinking moment while the page loads up. Paula's been good about protecting Kate's privacy—their privacy—but they've had a few incidents. People snapping photos of them when it's obvious they're not on the job. A few blind items and the usual rumor mill.

He holds his breath as the thread fills the page. It's a long cascade already, and it takes him a while to scroll to the original post, entitled "Rescue!" He taps the link. It expands to a short loop of video.

The camerawork is shaky to say the least, and the lighting isn't helping things. There's a glare high up and the bottom of the screen is thrown into shadow.

The soundtrack is a blare of nonsense, but it's him. It's unmistakably him, just missing the bulldog's collar and crashing to the floor in a flurry of paws, ears, and plump, cotton-tailed rabbit butts.

It's comical. Or he supposes it would be comical if he didn't have such a dead serious look on his face. Of course, that really just adds to the comedy.

He watches himself. It's odd. He doesn't even remember. In the moment, he just felt like terrain—an obstacle or a target—but he sees himself lifting and shooing and helping rabbit after rabbit escape to the far side of his body. Away from the snarling pair of dogs.

He's nodding and looking off screen to the right and answering someone. Looking back toward stream of rabbits and doing everything he can to funnel them the right way. A volunteer, he remembers now. He was shouting instructions to herd them in that direction. That's why they all went that way. All but two, facing the tide.

The video ends there. A still of the tiny black rabbit sitting atop his knee. The big rabbit is on the floor just below her rearing up. It ends there, with all three of them looking back into the fray.

"Well."

He startles at the sound of her voice. He fumbles with the phone, trying to close the tab, but it's too late. She was watching over his shoulder the whole time.

"Well," she says again, and there's something odd about her voice.

He shifts in the chair to get a better look at her face. To figure out if he's in trouble or if it's something else.

But he doesn't have a chance. She's coming for him. All of a sudden, she's clambering over the arm of her chair and into his. She's sliding her knees on either side of his thighs and taking the phone from his hand. She's winding herself all around him and pressing her cheek to his chest.

She's holding the phone out and her thumb is hovering over the screen. She taps the

post and restarts the loop. She laughs and gasps and presses herself close against him. She says his name and trails off. She presses her mouth against his jaw in a wide smile.

She pauses the video at the moment he is absolutely covered in rabbits. One on each shoulder and the little fawn-colored one on his chest, looking up at him. Another three or four thumping over his lap.

She pauses it and kisses him soundly. She's laughing, but there's a tripping little sigh under it, too. She kisses him and scrubs forward to the end. To the three of them.

"Well." She sighs again, but it's happy this time. It's delighted. "You were right, Castle. It could have been worse."

* * *

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: Mary Sue-ing myself a little here. I did find a lovely brindle dog wandering in my neighborhood. I talked him into the back of my car, then stashed him in my yard while I called around to figure out what to do with him. Took him to a very good "accepts all animals, no kill" shelter near the house. They were crazy busy that day, so I had to sit for a long while waiting for someone who could do his intake, getting more attached to him the whole time. I did not, alas, run into a charming, ruggedly handsome writer. I did, however, blubber when leaving the pup.


End file.
